OPENING one day a book of mine, I absent, Hester found a line Praised with a pencil-mark, and this She left transfigured with a kiss. When next upon the page I chance, Like Poussin's nymphs my pulses dance, And whirl my fancy where it sees Pan piping 'neath Arcadian trees, Whose leaves no winter-scenes rehearse, Still young and glad as Homer's verse. "What mean," I ask, "these sudden joys? This feeling fresher than a boy's? What makes this line, familiar long, New as the first bird's April song? I could, with sense illumined thus, Clear doubtful texts in Æschylus!" Laughing, one day she gave the key, My riddle's open-sesame; Then added, with a smile demure, Whose downcast lids veiled triumph sure, "If what I left there give you pain, You — you — can take it off again; 'T was for @3my@1 poet, not for him, Your Doctor Donne there!" Earth grew dim And wavered in a golden mist, As rose, not paper, leaves I kissed. Donne, you forgive? I let you keep Her precious comment, poet deep. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...IN A STRANGE CITY by LOUIS UNTERMEYER IMPRESSION by EDMUND WILLIAM GOSSE SONNET: 23. ON HIS DECEASED WIFE by JOHN MILTON MASSACHUSETTS TO VIRGINIA by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER SONNET: THE RARITY OF GENIUS by THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH THE EMPTY BOTTLE by WILLIAM EDMONSTOUNE AYTOUN |